Coach's Corner - It's Summer!!!!

[cewait]

I hope all had a great Memorial Day. With the unofficial start to summer many folks are lacing them up and heading out the door. Please take care as you head out for your run.

Visibility
Many folks are forced to run early or late due to work, family or heat. If you are running near the twilight or dusk place make yourself visible. Most tech wear has some form of reflective striping, but find a vest, or some other reflective gear in addition to your clothing. It your streets are dark, consider a light. It will help light the way as your make your way along the street.

Hydration
We can post a series of posts for hydration but one must hydrate if you are going to run through the summer. Hydration starts well before your run – it is a daily habit that all athletes should follow to drink 8-10 glasses of water a day. Hydrating while on the run is a lot simpler than it was as we now have hand held flasks, water belts and water bladders. – more to come. Ione can over hydrate so a real simple rule to follow is to weigh yourself pre-run then reweigh post run. If you lsot weight, you did not bring on enough fluid or if you come back heavier, you brought on too much.

Road Safety
Run against traffic if you run in the street. You are much better prepared to see an errant driver if you can look them in the eyes as they approach rather than hope they see you from behind. In my years I have had to leave the roadway over a dozen times while out for a run and even then I have not been 100% successful. Yes I was hit by a car in an intersection while on a business trip. Fortunately, I was able to react and the hit was glancing. Also, carry ID with you. I prefer RoadID since the message is engraved or via an 800 number for those with lots of data to relay. I usually have a lighter stripe on my right wrist where the ID rides all summer. The ID will help spek for you in the event you cannot.

 

[mahipp]

Thank you for the tips!

I hate the feel of something on my wrist, so last time I was at WDW, I made an ID tag at a machine in the arcade outside Space Mountain. I put my name, DOB, my husband's name and phone # and my daughter's name and phone #. I wear it on a lanyard with my house key.

 

[dreams91]

Glad to have you back on the board again. missed your posts. What can you tell me about heart rate being too high? At 39, my max should be around 181. Many times my rate is around 170+. I wear a monitor around my chest many runs to monitor. I feel like my legs could go faster, but I can't get enough oxygen to do so (obviously anaerobic). I only run about 13:30- 14:00 min pace, so I'm super slow! And I'm not losing any weight with all my running..... Any thoughts on what I can do? Who to see?

 

[cewait]

Glad to have you back on the board again. missed your posts. What can you tell me about heart rate being too high? At 39, my max should be around 181. Many times my rate is around 170+. I wear a monitor around my chest many runs to monitor. I feel like my legs could go faster, but I can't get enough oxygen to do so (obviously anaerobic). I only run about 13:30- 14:00 min pace, so I'm super slow! And I'm not losing any weight with all my running..... Any thoughts on what I can do? Who to see?

First of all, the age based formulas are not an absolute way to determine 'best' places to workout. What we have found through metabolic assessments is that only about 10-15% of the population fit the formula. That's the great news.

So when you are moving at 170 bpm, what does the effort feel like? Could you talk at that effort? Can you keep the effort up for a while, or are you needing to stop fairly quickly. From the little data I have, it seems like you are not quite anaerobic at the 170 area, but at the very upper end of aerobic.

If you have a treadmill and possibly a friend to assist, a simple non-maximal test can be performed to help zero in on anaerobic threshold. In real simple terms, we want to start you out at 0% elevation and at an effort you could keep for 10-15 minutes. THen have you say a 7 word phrase every other minute. You assistance will hold you to the phrase and assess whether you are trying to get off the mill early. Then every other minute you add elevation. Soon you will get to a point where you could only say a couple syllables and are seriously looking for a way to stop. The HR at which this occurs is a good estimation of AT.

From there its a simple - you want to start your long runs out about 15% below that effort - or a little slower and allow HR to creep up through the run. You may feel like you are running slower, but in a few weeks you will speed up.

Mid week runs should be run in the upper 10% of the aerobic zone. Especially hill and speed work. I guess I should say, I would run hills and intervals in an effort to improve leg strength and aerobic capacity.

Finally, if you are looking for a more exact set of numbers to work with, many gyms have metabolic assessments. These are nearly painless and will give more certain numbers for workouts as well as tying in the fat and glycogen burn rates during differing levels of work.

Hope this helps

 

[wvjules]

So it's going to be pushing 88-90 when I run later (after work). I've been drinking a mix of powerade zero and water all day. Any other tips? (I can't run after dinner. It just doesn't work for me.)

I will try to start running before work now that it's so hot but today that didn't happen and I have to run. If I wait until tomorrow it will be 2 days off and that doesn't agree with me either.

ETA: It's only going to be a 30-45 minute run. Nothing too long or hard.

 

[cewait]

So it's going to be pushing 88-90 when I run later (after work). I've been drinking a mix of powerade zero and water all day. Any other tips? (I can't run after dinner. It just doesn't work for me.)

I will try to start running before work now that it's so hot but today that didn't happen and I have to run. If I wait until tomorrow it will be 2 days off and that doesn't agree with me either.

ETA: It's only going to be a 30-45 minute run. Nothing too long or hard.

Ahhhh Houston Weather. Hopefully it will be cooler there when I arrive next week.

You are doing most everything you can. If you need a snack pre-run, grab it as you walk out the door of work or early in the commute home. Otherwise, don't grab the pre-run snack later so that it is not in the gut sicking out fluids.

If you have a visor throw it on to protect the face as well as sun glasses. These two will lower the stress in the face muscles and allow for a better run. Wear white to reflect the remaining sunlight. I guess it goes without saying, all fabrics are tech fabric. If you are in a heavily treed area, run shade to shade.

Start off about a minute a mile slower than you feel like you can run. Then if you feel good after the first mile ramp up the effort. If you have a water bottle you can carry, it may lend a little emotional support, but it is not 100% necessary with the length of run described.

If it is any consolation, I love running in the 4:30-5:00 time period this time of year (here we are generally 90+ just after work until October). The heat, while mentally tough is not too high. Mentally I feel like if I can survive the battle, it will eventually pay off on race day.

 

[wvjules]

I'm glad to hear my plan is a sound one. I have a white tech shirt and my visor and sunglasses with me to wear too. I'd rather have a sucky run today than no run today. I just cannot be off 2 days in a row.

I'm planning on doing WDW full in January so I'll just use these hot runs as warm ups for the big event. (I'm slow so it will definately be hot and sunny when I finish.)

 

[Rose&Mike]

So it's going to be pushing 88-90 when I run later (after work). I've been drinking a mix of powerade zero and water all day. Any other tips? (I can't run after dinner. It just doesn't work for me.)

I will try to start running before work now that it's so hot but today that didn't happen and I have to run. If I wait until tomorrow it will be 2 days off and that doesn't agree with me either.

ETA: It's only going to be a 30-45 minute run. Nothing too long or hard.

I would also add, don't be afraid to take walk breaks if you need them--even if you don't normally take them, they can really help to get through some nasty hot runs. We regularly run when the temps are in the upper 80s/low 90s in the summer and will throw in walk breaks on our short runs depending on how nasty the heat/humidity is that day. I do not normally take walk breaks for less than 6 miles unless it's hot. I like running in the heat, once I get "re" used to it each year. Hope it went well!

 

[cewait]

I'm glad to hear my plan is a sound one. I have a white tech shirt and my visor and sunglasses with me to wear too. I'd rather have a sucky run today than no run today. I just cannot be off 2 days in a row.

I'm planning on doing WDW full in January so I'll just use these hot runs as warm ups for the big event. (I'm slow so it will definately be hot and sunny when I finish.)

Hope your run went well

 

[wvjules]

Well, I didn't get to run. It started storming here right at 5:30 and rained pretty much all evening. Figures! lol

 

[PrincessV]

Mentally I feel like if I can survive the battle, it will eventually pay off on race day.

I keep thinking that if I can survive training through the long, hot, humid Florida summer, I should be setting new PRs all over the place, come winter!

I think I follow pretty much everything I've seen mentioned in this thread, but I'll add a couple more interesting tidbits I've found helpful lately...

1. Rain feels GREAT in the heat! A lot of my recent runs have been in the rain and, man, what a difference it makes in how I feel and, therefore, how I run! Sadly, we're heading into summer storm season here, so it'll be hard to find times when there's rain but no lightning - lightning = treadmill. And I hate the treadmill.

2. In addition to looking out for cars when running in the dark, be aware of critters. I had a run-in with a coyote on my 5am run last week. All turned out fine - she ran away and I ran my fastest split ever - but it surprised the heck out of me and instead of shouting, waving my arms, etc., I went silent. I'll know better for next time!

 

[cewait]

I keep thinking that if I can survive training through the long, hot, humid Florida summer, I should be setting new PRs all over the place, come winter!

I think I follow pretty much everything I've seen mentioned in this thread, but I'll add a couple more interesting tidbits I've found helpful lately...

1. Rain feels GREAT in the heat! A lot of my recent runs have been in the rain and, man, what a difference it makes in how I feel and, therefore, how I run! Sadly, we're heading into summer storm season here, so it'll be hard to find times when there's rain but no lightning - lightning = treadmill. And I hate the treadmill.

I agree 100%. I love running in the evening rain. Though We tend to have gulf showers that are kind of weak. All they do is drop just enough rain to get the roads wet and then the sun comes out. Humidity squared for the next 15 minutes.

2. In addition to looking out for cars when running in the dark, be aware of critters. I had a run-in with a coyote on my 5am run last week. All turned out fine - she ran away and I ran my fastest split ever - but it surprised the heck out of me and instead of shouting, waving my arms, etc., I went silent. I'll know better for next time!

I once ran into a feral hog who just dropped a litter about 10 yards off the edge of a roadway. She was more than protective. Who would have thought a pig could run that fast.

 

[John VN]

.......In addition to looking out for cars when running in the dark, be aware of critters. I had a run-in with a coyote on my 5am run last week. All turned out fine - she ran away and I ran my fastest split ever - but it surprised the heck out of me and instead of shouting, waving my arms, etc., I went silent. I'll know better for next time!

DW and I will be at FW for our 39th. anniversary. I will be getting out at 4:00AM for a 15 miler one morning on the roads around the campground and will have to keep eyes open for deer, armadillo, lots of bunny rabbits and other nighttime critters. Last time there I met up with some deer on the roads and even had one running with me for a 100 feet before it jumped off into the woods. Also have to watch out for suicidal squirrel that start to run away and then pull a u-turn right back in front of you.

Regarding vehicles, I give the drivers a wave and thank you when they move over. If they make me move off the road I do nothing.

 

[cewait]

DW and I will be at FW for our 39th. anniversary. I will be getting out at 4:00AM for a 15 miler one morning on the roads around the campground and will have to keep eyes open for deer, armadillo, lots of bunny rabbits and other nighttime critters. Last time there I met up with some deer on the roads and even had one running with me for a 100 feet before it jumped off into the woods. Also have to watch out for suicidal squirrel that start to run away and then pull a u-turn right back in front of you.

Regarding vehicles, I give the drivers a wave and thank you when they move over. If they make me move off the road I do nothing.

I am in town quite often and run either the boardwalk/DHS loop or OKW/DTD... I would not worry about the rabbits. They are animitronics. I swear these are the bravest bunnies on earth.

 

[MightyDuck001]

So it turns out I'm running faster in the heat: I suspect the half marathon has helped me start moving faster but in all honesty I'm running away from bugs. What do you do to keep the bugs at bay that doesn't get all gross and sticky in about 5 minutes? I'm running down the street flailing like Phoebe on friends at this point trying to get away from god-knows-what.

I know it's tough to be a bug, but can't they stop flying into me?!

 

[Bound and Rebound]

I'm running down the street flailing like Phoebe on friends at this point trying to get away from god-knows-what.

I know it's tough to be a bug, but can't they stop flying into me?!

I totally looked like that last week when I came up on a pond to one side of the road!!

Thankfully, it was not a big pond. I figured all the drivers thought I was crazy!

 

[PrincessV]

I agree 100%. I love running in the evening rain. Though We tend to have gulf showers that are kind of weak. All they do is drop just enough rain to get the roads wet and then the sun comes out. Humidity squared for the next 15 minutes.

Yep, that's the potential downside to rain-runs, for sure.

I once ran into a feral hog who just dropped a litter about 10 yards off the edge of a roadway. She was more than protective. Who would have thought a pig could run that fast.

EEK!

Last time there I met up with some deer on the roads and even had one running with me for a 100 feet before it jumped off into the woods.

How cool! I'm planning a short run to FW this summer while at VWL - hope I get to see some fun critters, too!

What do you do to keep the bugs at bay that doesn't get all gross and sticky in about 5 minutes? I'm running down the street flailing like Phoebe on friends at this point trying to get away from god-knows-what.

Oh yes, I've done that move a few times! We get swarms on the golf course I run, especially. I've been known to close my eyes and hold my breath to avoid breathing them in, but it's probably not the safest method...

 

[ColleenG]

I caught a bug the other night out on a run. Spit that sucker right out! YUCK!!

 

[DisneyRunnerGirl]

Thank you for the tips!

I hate the feel of something on my wrist, so last time I was at WDW, I made an ID tag at a machine in the arcade outside Space Mountain. I put my name, DOB, my husband's name and phone # and my daughter's name and phone #. I wear it on a lanyard with my house key.

Just an FYI - you can get Road IDs in styles that don't have to been wore on the wrist. My sister likes the tag that attaches to her shoe laces.

 

[mahipp]

Just an FYI - you can get Road IDs in styles that don't have to been wore on the wrist. My sister likes the tag that attaches to her shoe laces.

I saw those, but I don't wear the same shoes every day.